Life After PenguinDiagnose, Recover, Rebuild

Ian Howells@ianhowells

DIAGNOSE

Diagnosis Steps

halo18.com

1. Confirm the date you got hit

2. Confirm if your hit is site-wide or page specific

3. Find the problem areas

In Case You’ve Been Asleep

halo18.com

April 24th – Shit got real.

Which Update Hit Me?

halo18.com

Google’s rolling out multiple updates in a short time frame.

3/19 – BMR/ALN get de-indexed4/19 – Panda 3.54/24 – Penguin4/27 – Panda 3.65/26 – Penguin 1.1

Site-Wide or Page Specific?

halo18.com

1. Did every page lose it’s rankings?

2. Can you rank a new page for a lower competition term?

RECOVER

Causes

halo18.com

Luckily, this isn’t all that complicated.

We’re essentially looking at:

1. Over-optimized anchor text2. Lots of low quality, off-topic links

More than 65% Anchor? Good Luck Bro(image via @MicrositeMaster - http://bit.ly/PrEduZ )

RECOVERY EXAMPLES

WPMU.org Recovery

halo18.com

Ross Hudgens worked with WPMU.org to recover by…

1. Removing 15,000 site-wide footer links from an owned propertya. Matt Cutts says this did it

2. Misc on-site issues like canonical URLs

WPMU.org’s Recovery(image via @rosshudgens - http://mz.cm/MwwveE )

My MFA Test

halo18.com

I started wondering if the penalty could really just be linked to the URL.

Could I really just paste the content onto a new URL and rank off my content and what’s left of my domain authority?

Sure Can

My MFA Test

halo18.com

I then tested if a 301 from the “penalized” page will pass the ranking hit to the new URL.

YUP – Vanished 5 Days Later

REBUILD

What We Already Know

halo18.com

Based on my tests thus far, if your penalty is just on the page level, you can start over with the same domain.

What We Already Know

halo18.com

Unless it torched your home page.

Then, you might just be screwed – unless you control a huge chunk of your links like WPMU did, or can get them removed.

What We Already Know

halo18.com

I haven’t seen any duplicate content issue from copy/pasting old content to a brand new page.

What We Already Know

halo18.com

You can’t, however, keep those links by 301’ing them into your new URL.

Rebuild

halo18.com

If your home page is safe, start moving your torched pages to new URLs without any 301 redirect and go back to link building.

Rebuild

halo18.com

For solid links to your old (now dead) URLs – you’ll need to do outreach to get them changed to your new URL.

Rebuild

halo18.com

The alternative to moving pages would be to find your spam links and get them taken down… and then wait for the next refresh/update.

Rebuild

halo18.com

I took one look at how much work that would be, and promptly decided that trying that would be reserved for the crazy and desperate.

MORE TESTING

On-Going Testing

halo18.com

I’m currently looking into theimpacts of…

302 redirectsCanonical TagsAlternate Home PagesCross-Domain 301’s

302 Redirects

halo18.com

Would a 302 pass (even some) ranking benefit without passing the penalty?

Canonical Tag

halo18.com

Can you pass some ranking benefit without passing the penalty via the Canonical Tag?

Alternate Home Pages

halo18.com

If my home page is torched, can I switch my home page to be /index.php or /home/ and use a 302 or canonical from the root of the .com to skirt the penalty?

Cross-Domain 301

halo18.com

If these 301’s are poison (which they seem to be) – will that hold true if I point to a separate domain?

Negative SEO?

halo18.com

If the other page is targeting the same keywords that I was, could you use a 301 like this for negative SEO?

An “I’m Innocent!” Loophole?

halo18.com

If Google’s protecting against negative SEO – can you move your content to a new domain and rank it with the help of a 301 from your torched domain?

I DON’T KNOW YET.BUT, I’LL LET YOU KNOW.

SOON.

Ian Howells

@ianhowellshalo18.com